What is CPRT?
Child-Parent-Relationship (C-P-R) Training is a special parent training program that is designed to help strengthen the relationship between a parent and a child by using 30-minute playtimes once a week. Children struggle to process cognitively, as the part of their brain essential to logical functioning is not fully formed yet. Because of this, play is the most natural way children communicate. Think of play as their “language” and toys as the “words” that build that language. Because adults are cognitive – we live in our heads – we are able to process our feelings and experiences with words (though play is great for us, too!). Because our children cannot process this way, they use play, toys, and other acts of expression to process thoughts, feelings, behaviors, and experiences.
In sessions – either individually, with coparents, or with a group of other parents who desire to build better relationships with their children – parents learn to have special structured 30-minute playtimes with their child using a kit of carefully selected toys in their own home. Parents learn how to respond empathically to their child’s feelings, build their child’s self-esteem, help their child learn self-control and self-responsibility, and set therapeutic limits during these special playtimes. All of this is then applied to the rest of home as well, with the support of a trained therapist.
For 30 minutes each week, the child is the center of the parent’s universe. In this special playtime, the parent creates an accepting relationship in which a child feels completely safe to express himself through his play—fears, likes, dislikes, wishes, anger, loneliness, joy, or feelings of failure. This is not a typical playtime. It is a special playtime in which the child leads and the parent follows. In this special relationship, there are no:
- reprimands
- put-downs
- evaluations
- requirements (to draw pictures a certain way, etc.)
- judgments (about the child or their play as being good or bad, right or wrong)
How can CPRT help?
In the special playtimes, you will build a deeper, healthier bond with your child — one based in unconditional positive regard. As this relationship grows, your child will discover that they are capable, important, understood, and accepted just as they are. When children experience a relationship – especially with play – in which they feel accepted, understood, and cared for without limits, they play out many of their problems and, in the process, release tensions, feelings, and burdens.
This release of tensions, feelings, and burdens allows for the growth if self-esteem, self-regulation, emotional vocabulary (they will start having words for their feelings), and expanded worldview (their ability to see their impact on others around them).
The increase of these four essential parts of a child’s development of self will result in their ability to discover and see their own strengths, as well as assume greater self-responsibility as they take charge of play situations. You will begin to see shifts in their behavior – more accountability, less power struggles, increased ability to consider other’s feelings and wishes…and more.
In the special playtimes where you learn to focus on your child rather than your child’s problem, your child will begin to react differently, because how your child behaves, how they think, and how they performs in school are directly related to how your child feels about themself – and how they feel that you feel about them. When your child feels better about themself, they will behave in more self-enhancing ways rather than self-defeating ways. This in turn, leads to better relationships with those around them – and a better relationship with themself.
Adapted from Child Parent Relationship Therapy (CPRT) Treatment Manual: An Evidence-Based 10-Session Filial Therapy Model, 2nd Edition, by Bratton, S., & Landreth, G. New York: Routledge. Permission to reproduce is granted. Copyright © 2020, Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.
